By Abba-Eku Onyekachi
The Principal partner of Friends Chambers and Abuja based legal luminary, Prince Orji Nwafor-Orizu, has condemned what he described as excluding people from the South-East geopolitical zone from key appointments by President Ahmed Bola Tinubu.
According to him depriving them of such appointments don’t reflect true federal system of government.
Nwafor-Orizu addressed journalists over the weekend in his chamber in the nation’s capital.
He said: “The appointments made by Mr President so far doesn’t obviously include the South-East and it is a dangerous thing.
“The presidents that ruled this country very well by putting the federal character into consideration were those who took time to understand that the appointments must be distributed.
“Good examples were Obasanjo and Shagari. They ensured that each geopolitical zone got position where it should have position.”
According to him, the major positions in Nigeria are President, Vice-President, Senate President, Speaker of the House, Secretary, Secretary to the Government of the Federation and the National Chairman of the party, adding that Obasanjo and Shagari ensured that each of the zones got at least one of such portfolios.
Blaming former President Gooldluck Jonathan for kickstarting imbalance in appointments, he said: “Immediately Jonathan came in, Jonathan took his position from the South South and gave the rest to the North.
“He didnt give any to the South-East and South West. That was the cause of Tinubu from the South-West and others teamed up to remove Jonathan.
“South-East was shy and they didn’t understand the politics. They would have joined hands to remove Jonathan, because he called them nobody.
“When Bulhari came, he went on, he made his appointments mainly from the North and people complained in vain”.
The lawyer further said they expected Tinubu to reddress the anomalies, but was dissapointed that when he came, Tinubu made his appointments from the Yoruba alone.
Urging the president to stop from yorubanising the appointments, he said that he has noted with dismay that since Jonathan, Buhari and Tinubu, none of the positions has come to the South-East.
According to him, Obasanjo lost election in his South-West and when he came in, he started assuaging them, making them part of his own, so that when he ran for second time, they voted for him.
Describing Tinubu’s style of appointments as “childish politics, politics of uninformed and that of people without brains”, he said to be talking that because you didn’t give them vote, they won’t give you appointment is not the best way to go about politics in a modern democracy.
